


i'm learning to fly (but i ain't got wings)

by orphan_account



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, post-episode: changing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-15
Updated: 2016-11-15
Packaged: 2018-08-31 04:15:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8563639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Alex always leaps before she looks and suddenly she's got to pull herself back up again.





	

Her phone buzzes on the table, once, twice, three times and finally Kara lets go of her and softly suggests that Alex get that. It could be important, she says, and Alex picks up because she didn’t go into work - stayed home and nursed a bottle of Crown - and for what?

Mon El’s missing so she doesn’t get to finish that thought.

*

Cadmus has Mon El, of course they do. Somewhere between guiding him to be a slightly, oh so slightly, better version of himself and his natural inclination towards carelessness they’d snagged him. There’s a video, another not-so-vaguely worded threat about the continued presence of aliens in the open, and Alex throws herself into this.

For Kara.

Because Kara cares about Mon El, he’s like the Clark she never got to protect and now she’s lost him too. Winn speed walks across the DEO to ask her if she’d like a tactical team. Alex thinks about clipped phone calls, finished sentences, and lips that should have never touched.

“Let’s keep this internal,” Alex says and hope it’s only her ears that heard ‘ _ please,  _ don’t call Maggie’.

*

They find Mon El strapped to a chair in an abandoned warehouse and it’s too easy, so easy that if Alex had been thinking properly, she would have pulled the team out. Reassessed the situation and thought for a second. Instead they’re surrounded and Alex kicks herself for diving in.

Alex has her hands behind her head, her gun on the ground at her feet, and her eyes closed hoping this isn’t the end. Though wouldn’t it just be her luck that she’s finally figuring out what’s been missing and now--

There’s a loud boom, like the sound of a door caving in from a battering ram, and Alex opens her eyes to see Cadmus agents scattering and the NCPD storming the area. Alex picks up her weapon and doesn’t think, she just joins in. All things considered they don’t actually capture anyone from Cadmus but Mon El isn’t dead so that’s a strike in the win column.

Out of all of the NCPD officers, Alex only picks out one face. Maggie, Alex shakes her head and shakes off the familiarity, Detective Sawyer. For once she’s hanging around in the background and it makes Alex feel a little better to know that she’s not the only one who doesn’t know how to proceed next.

*

Inevitably Alex ends up back at their bar -  _ the _ bar - she corrects herself because everyone seems to hang out there now even if it sort of feels like it was their thing. But they don’t really have things so Alex orders bourbon and throws darts in the back corner by herself. She doesn’t have to try hard to give off an inaccessible vibe, so nobody really bothers her.

You can’t really reclaim things if they were never really yours to begin with but this feels like the first step.

*

Kara orders potstickers, pizza, and brings Ben and Jerry’s over to Alex’s apartment and forces herself through an  _ Evil Dead _ marathon even though Alex knows that Kara would rather make her watch  _ How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days _ for the thousandth time.

Even Kara knows that’s a little bit too on the nose.

Alex eats way too much food and let’s Kara hug her and winces when Kara hugs her too hard because for an alien who actively fights evil she’s awfully afraid of fictional horror.

Somewhere in the middle of  _ Army of Darkness _ , Alex looks over and sees that Kara’s fallen asleep. She kisses her sister on the forehead and covers them both with a blanket. Alex knows she’s going to wake up tomorrow morning with a crick in her neck and Kara will be absolutely fine but for right now she lets the screams and chainsaw noises lull her to sleep.

It’s the happiest she’s been in days.

*

Alex’s throwing darts with a little less precision and a lot more anger and if the bar occupants gave her a wide berth before, they might not even dare glancing in her direction tonight.

M’gann is the only one brave enough to even get in her vicinity and that’s only for a few pleasantries and drink refills. Well vodka that tastes like witch hazel but works quickly enough for her purposes.

Which, to be clear, is to get wasted and throw sharp objects at a board.

Not a recommended combination on most days but on this particular day she’d closed her first case with Maggie - Detective  _ Sawyer _ , Alex reminds herself - since the rejection and she’s not exactly sure how this friends thing is supposed to go but she’s absolutely sure they’d have to complete full sentences to each other first.

Full sentences that don’t involve the case, which alien is attacking where, and other work related phrases.

If she was being a little more fair and a little less drunk, Alex might admit that she didn’t exactly make it easy for Maggie to try and be friendly. Alright, in truth she hasn’t been that cold and professional since their first meeting but she doesn’t know how to do this.

She doesn’t know how to like somebody so much that it makes her feel like doing absolutely reckless, stupid, brave, dumb shit like kissing her in the middle of their bar, by their pool table.

_ The _ bar.  _ The _ pool table.

And Alex knows reckless, she once flew a Kryptonian pod into space and battering rammed Kara back down through the atmosphere. She regularly throws herself in the line of danger and almost certain death. But being close to a person she wants so badly who doesn’t want her back? Who still wants to be her friend and still wants to help her find her way?

Even she doesn’t know how to be that reckless.

*

Another week comes and goes, another case, another call from Detective Sawyer, another chip in the ice of their cold war. It’s amazing how things can start to feel normal after a while. Alex knows pain, maybe more than her fair share of it. She knows how to take the feelings that she has and put them in a neat box.

She knows how to work case after case with Detective Sawyer who looks at her like she’s trying to figure something out. Alex who knows, who can tell that Detective Sawyer is trying to figure out when Alex will be safe again. Safe to be a friend in need of guidance and nothing more.

As they work together Alex starts to close that little box, one flap at a time. Little by little she starts to pack these little things away. Like the way Detective Sawyer smiles and Alex feels like she can’t breathe because she’s been to space but that’s brighter than the sun. The way their thoughts start to flow into one fluid motion again and Alex tries to remember who outside of Kara she’s ever felt so close to.

One at a time Alex starts to let normal seep back in and it’s not like she wakes up one day and doesn’t have feelings for Detective Sawyer -  _ Maggie _ \- anymore. It’s just, she’s packed it away like you do with things that don’t have a place.

Until Maggie looks at her - they’ve been chasing some dead end Cadmus lead all across National City and Alex really, really could use a break - and Maggie looks at her and asks if she wants to go play some pool. Blow off some steam, Maggie say and Alex looks past the detente to see peace.

“I still owe you those drinks,” Maggie jokes and Alex looks past the discomfort in her voice, the offer to buy her those drinks she’d promised before a kiss and everything got so complicated.

It’s a test.

“As long as you’re paying,” Alex smiles and turns her back to lead the way before Maggie can see that it doesn’t quite reach her eyes.

It’s a start.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Learning to Fly by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers because it just fits.


End file.
